Jan Egeland, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General
for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, in his opening
statement to a press conference held today at the Palais des Nations in
Geneva, said that as Emergency Relief Coordinator, he found one of his
most difficult missions was to bring attention to the most neglected and
forgotten emergencies. For each one that received funding and profiling,
there were a dozen neglected emergencies, some of which turned, despite
early warnings, into full-blown catastrophes, such as in Niger and the
sahel in Africa.